By Naveen Athrappully

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested 38 illegal immigrants, including convicted criminals, from multiple construction sites during a targeted enforcement operation, the agency said in a Feb. 24 statement.

The illegal immigrants were arrested from construction sites in El Paso, Texas, and Santa Teresa, New Mexico, during a nine-day operation between Jan. 11 and 19 carried out by ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations El Paso and local law enforcement partners.

“Among those arrested were four individuals charged with felony illegal reentry and two ICE fugitives with final orders of removal,” ICE said.

“Officers also encountered and rescued three illegal alien children, ages 15, 16, and 17, who were unlawfully employed at various construction sites. ICE transferred them to Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement’s custody.”

Out of the 38 illegal immigrants, eight had criminal histories. One individual had been convicted of assault causing bodily injury to a family member. Another was convicted for failing to identify as a fugitive, the agency said.

In addition to ICE, other departments that took part in the operation include Border Patrol, Homeland Security Investigations, and the Texas Department of Public Safety.

“We will continue to aggressively pursue criminal investigations and enforce immigration laws to preserve national security and public safety,” said Joel Garcia, ICE El Paso acting field office director.

“These ongoing, routine enforcement operations and arrests underscore ICE’s unwavering commitment to holding accountable those who violate U.S. immigration law and threaten the safety of our communities.”

In September 2025, around 450 workers, several of them from South Korea, were detained by federal authorities during an immigration enforcement operation after they were found to be working at Hyundai’s Georgia complex.

At the time, Steven Schrank, the special agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations for Georgia, said this operation was the “largest single-site enforcement operation in the history of Homeland Security Investigations.”

On April 15, 2025, ICE announced the arrest of more than 1,000 illegal immigrant workers in the United States who did not have employment authorization.

Crackdown on Foreign Workers

The Trump administration’s immigration enforcement against foreign workers has raised concerns about worker shortages in the construction industry and other sectors.

In a Jan. 15 statement, the Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) group, a national construction industry trade association, said the industry must attract an estimated 349,000 net new employees this year to meet demand for construction services, a figure that jumps to 456,000 new workers next year.

ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu said the impact of immigration policy is a “potential wildcard” for the industry’s labor force dynamics.

“While the extent to which undocumented workers have exited the workforce remains unclear, data regarding border encounters indicate that the flow of undocumented workers into the country fell precipitously in 2025 while voluntary deportations accelerated,” Basu said.

On Feb. 13, more than 40 lawmakers sent a letter to the Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Children & Families, raising concerns about the effect of the immigration crackdown on the child care workforce, according to a Feb. 17 statement from the office of Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), one of the signatories.

The U.S. child care sector “depends heavily” on immigrant workers, who make up roughly 20 percent of the workforce, the letter said, adding that the share goes up to 70 percent in some areas.

The Trump administration has instituted several immigration policies, including terminating the Temporary Protected Status for immigrants from several nations and eliminating lawful immigration pathways.

This is “driving child care providers out of the workplace, exacerbating child care workforce shortages and high prices,” the lawmakers wrote.

“The Trump Administration’s policies risk eliminating a significant number of trained caregivers from an already strained system, reducing access to care and raising child care costs for American families.”

Lawmakers have taken action to tackle the issue of labor shortages. In September 2025, Rep. Lloyd Smucker (R-Pa.) reintroduced the Essential Workers for Economic Advancement Act, H.R. 5494, which would create a temporary worker program targeting foreign workers, according to a Sept. 23 statement from the lawmaker’s office.

“The bill creates a new H-2C nonimmigrant visa, available to employers who prove their positions have gone unfilled for three consecutive months and in areas where the unemployment rate is 7.9 percent or less,” the statement said.

According to Smucker, this guest worker program would ensure that workforce shortages in key industries are addressed “while ensuring American workers are prioritized.”